


ghosts

by jemejem



Series: married to my enemy [5]
Category: All For The Game - Nora Sakavic
Genre: Butcher!Neil, Cop!Andrew, Implied/Referenced Child Abuse, Implied/Referenced Rape/Non-con, Implied/Referenced Torture, M/M, Mobster/Cop AU, Murder
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-03-22
Updated: 2020-03-22
Packaged: 2021-03-01 05:40:23
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,975
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/23260045
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/jemejem/pseuds/jemejem
Summary: Drake is given parole. Neil does his father proud out of necessity.(Nothing graphic: just heavy implications. Heed the warnings.)
Relationships: Neil Josten/Andrew Minyard
Series: married to my enemy [5]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1582144
Comments: 9
Kudos: 480





	ghosts

Neil traversed their kitchen as he threw together a curry Renee had recommended, whistling very poorly with the TV on in the background. An Exy game was always playing, much to Andrew’s dismay. 

They’d been living together for about a year and a half, and engaged for nearly a week now. Neil thought he couldn’t possibly get any happier, which was odd and unfamiliar in his tragic life. As he rinsed the starch off the rice and threw it into the rice cooker (gifted to him by Allison because once he’d served her undercooked, burnt rice and she’d never forgiven him since) he heard the front door unlock and twist open, the familiar shuffle of his _fiancé_ arriving home making Neil smile. 

That sentiment was lost when he turned around to greet him. 

“Andrew,” Neil managed, watching Andrew fall onto the couch. He looked at the television, eyes so distant that they couldn’t register Neil even as he crouched down in front of him. “Andrew?”

His hands were shaking, curled into fists by his sides. Neil had never seen his skin so pale and lifeless. 

“Andrew,” he continued. “Can i sit next to you?” When he didn’t answer, Neil slowly moved to sit on the couch, giving him enough time to shove him back. Neil kept at least a centimetre between them at every point. 

“I’m making dinner,” he said, trying to think of something mundane to draw him out of his head. “Curry, one of Renee’s. You said you tried it and liked it. It has lamb, and I’ve snuck in some peas, but the sauce tastes good enough that we should be able to ignore them.” His fists relaxed slightly, the longer Neil talked. “You remember that cat shelter that I said was a front? Well, it’s still a cat shelter. Maybe we could check it out, see if there are any hairless ones. I know you like the hairless ones.” 

Andrew reached out for Neil’s hand and closed his eyes. His thumb traced the scars on Neil’s skin. The pattern was familiar and comforting for Andrew: Neil sighed with relief. 

“I’ve got those off-brand icecream sticks you love,” Neil continued, leaning in closer. “There was only one box left that weren’t those coconut-raspberry ones. Pure chocolate, just for you. Maybe we could dip them in sprinkles.” 

Andrew hummed softly. 

“Hey,” Neil said under his breath, leaning closer. He never asked if Andrew was okay, if he was alright, how his day went: not when he was like this. Asking a question meant requiring an answer, and providing a template meant forcing a restricted response. Andrew didn’t need to give Neil falsities. They were past that.

“Drake is being let out on parole.” 

Drake _fucking_ Spear. 

Andrew told Neil the story a year into dating. He was in college, with his cousin and his brother. They’d moved to South Carolina, lived under Betsy’s roof as a reprieve from their biological family, and then congregated at their local college. All was fine until Andrew’s foster-home past caught up with him, the last time they’d gone to visit Nicky’s mother and father. 

Drake had been waiting for Andrew in Nicky’s old bedroom. It was safe to say that when Nicky and Aaron found them, it wasn’t pretty. Andrew had intentionally fucked with his biological mother’s car when he figured out she was treating Aaron like shit: in return, Aaron had wrenched Drake (a _marine_ seal) off his brother and kicked the life out of him. 

Only he didn’t die. He went to jail. Aaron went to trail and claimed self-defence on his brother’s behalf. Everything was meant to be fine. 

Eight years later, Andrew was here, sitting on the couch as he reminisced upon horrid memory after horrid memory, knowing that his old demon was loose once more. 

“I’ll kill him.” Neil murmured. 

Andrew finally looked at him. “Neil.” 

He looked up. “I would kill him a thousand times over, Andrew.” 

Andrew said nothing, his head falling to rest on Neil’s shoulder. By the amount of tension coiled in Andrew’s shoulders, he must have been holding this in all day. 

Neil set his jaw, unwillingly to lie to himself. He was going to commit a self-serving, premeditated murder. 

His father would be so proud. 

*

When it finally happened, Andrew was coming home from dinner at Nicky and Erik’s. Neil was still working, somewhere in the depths of the city, but it was fine. Andrew had been able to distract himself from the weight pressing on his shoulders for a few hours with his cousin. 

A whole month since Drake - no, Spear - had been out on parole, and Andrew hadn’t heard a peep. For a while Andrew had thought that perhaps Spear would go to Aaron instead, the man who’d bashed him good but not good enough to avoid jail, but Aaron had heard nothing. Chicago was way too far from South Carolina, where he’d been held for his crimes. 

But Baltimore wasn’t.

He unlocked his front door and felt the way it was loose, too loose, observing the scratches on the bolt’s screws. Andrew grit his teeth, pulling out the knife from his armband and wishing he’d brought home his gun, to swing the door open. 

As expected, the apartment was dark. But not empty. 

“Evening, AJ.” 

“Isn’t this dramatic,” Andrew insisted, though his insides were twisted with fear. _Don’t lock up. Don’t lock up. Don’t -_

“I was waiting for you. I’ve missed you.” 

Andrew punched the lightswitch hard enough for the wall to buckle: it held, and instead revealed something worse than Drake and his sneer. 

Neil was bound to a dining chair with cuffs Andrew kept, just in case, a tie around his mouth. He looked incredibly woozy. Andrew wanted so desperately to go to him, but Spear himself was sat on the arm of their new couch, elbows braced on his knees. Andrew hated his slick grin and his knowing smile and his soulless fucking eyes. He couldn’t believe he’d almost killed himself over this man, thinking at least he would die knowing what a mother’s love felt like. 

A mother’s love shouldn’t have cost Andrew a thing, let alone nearly everything. Those scars on his arms were warped with time and a long journey to healing, and Drake wasn’t going to take that away from him again. 

“You learned a few tricks in prison,” Andrew acknowledged. 

“You snatched yourself a husband-to-be,” Drake sneered. “How cute. I knew you’d liked it all along.” 

Andrew’s hand twitched. “You’re in violation of your parole, Drake. I’m going to arrest you.” 

“You’re a _cop_?” Drake spat out a laugh. It was guttural and wrong. Neil winced. “Well, ain’t that just _funny.”_

“Funny how I, the boy who’d had nothing and was still taken from, ended up with a fulfilling life, finding family and friends and a purposeful occupation, whilst you, a boy who’d had _everything_ and more, took your life for granted and ended up in the slammer for eight years, with more to come? Hilarious. I agree.” 

“I should’ve crushed your skull eight years ago,” Drake laughed. “No matter: I’ll make up for it now.” 

Neil met Andrew’s eyes as his hands fiddled with the cuffs. _Keep talking._

“Why, Drake?” Andrew’s voice cracked. “You had Cass. School. Friends. Everyone _liked_ you. What drove you to ruin your own life?” 

“I did have everything I could’ve ever needed,” he said, teeth oily as he grinned. “But what I _wanted_ was something I couldn’t have. Till it occurred to me that I didn’t need to _have_ it. I just needed to take it.” He sneered, putting his hands to the arm of the couch as he readied to stand. “Did it hurt you, little AJ? Because I hope it did. I always liked it best when you bled -” 

The man froze. 

“Then I’ll make sure that you get what you’re owed, Drake Spear,” Neil said softly, balancing his knife between his fingertips. Its blade rested against Drake’s throat, Neil free of his cuffs and gag. 

Andrew hid his shaking fists.

“Best practise is putting things away after you use them,” Neil advised, lifting a cloth to Drake’s mouth and nose. The man’s eyes rolled to the back of his head as he slumped over, falling to the ground with a heavy thud. 

Andrew sucked in a gasp of air, watching as Neil cuffed the man’s wrists behind his back and stood with a boot pressed to his neck, should he wake up. 

From under the couch, Neil drew out a large tarp and his knives. Andrew closed his eyes momentarily. By the time he’d opened them, the coffee table had been flipped as a makeshift torture device, the tarp covering the carpet beneath. Neil was testing the sharpness of his cleaver against the tip of his finger: satisfied, he turned around to look at Andrew. “Help me roll him?”

Andrew looked at the man, hollowed out. “I was going to take him in.“

“What good is that?” Neil demanded, throwing the cleaver back into his pile. “He’ll go back to jail for another four to six months for violation of his parole, unless he tries to -” Neil screwed his eyes shut. “No. No, I won’t let him touch you again. And if you suggest some sort of self-sacrificing bullshit to have him locked up for good, I won’t buy it.” 

“He won’t get out on parole again -” 

“That is _not_ worth a fifteen year sentence that he’ll worm his way out of again, letting the cycle will just repeat itself. No, Andrew. He is never going to touch you again. He will never _look_ at you again.” His fists shook with a quiet fury. “I won’t let it happen.” 

“Neil,” Andrew stepped forward. “You need to let me do my job.” 

His fiancé brandished a knife from god-knows-where. “You need to let me do mine! Leave if you must. If your morals put you above killing a horrid man to keep my family safe, then go. But this man is not leaving here alive, nor whole. I am not letting the man I love subject himself to ruination via an old demon.” He finally looked Andrew in the eye. “Not if I can help it.” 

Neil bent over to drag Drake’s unconscious body over to where he needed it, locking his ankles and wrists to the four metal legs of their coffee table. The chloroform wasn’t strong enough to keep him asleep for long, but it didn’t matter. He was secure and doomed by the time he blinked his eyes open. 

Andrew watched Neil spin a knife between his fingers. 

“Wh - “ Drake coughed. “What? What happened?” 

“Not much,” Neil said, lightly. “You merely threatened to maim and kill the man I love, right in front of me.” His smile was the most frightening thing about him. “I don’t like that.”

“No,” Drake struggled against his restraints. “No!” 

“For now, I’ll shove this in there,” Neil said, grabbing the tie. “But later I’ll be sure to sever your vocal chords, so you can try and fail to scream, just like you tried to keep him quiet for years. No gag required. Neat, right?” 

“AJ,” Drake panted. “Andrew, get this psycho away from me. AJ -!” 

Neil shoved the tie into Drake’s mouth. “No. Stop looking at him. Look at me. I’m your biggest problem right now, aren’t I?” 

“I’m going to the study,” Andrew muttered, lightheaded. Neil glanced up at him: Andrew nodded, so minutely that anyone but Neil would’ve missed it. 

Neil’s expression softened slightly as clear understanding passed between them, bright as day. 

_Thank you for doing what I couldn’t,_ Andrew said. 

_Thank you for letting me,_ Neil returned. 

With a deep breath, Andrew turned away to put the kettle on as Neil got to work. 

**Author's Note:**

> :o


End file.
